The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1887-05-28
TEMPLES OF TRADE.


In New York the business structures
tain greater height than anywhere
else in the world. Some are $50 feet to
the roof and others 225 feet to the top
of the towers which surmount them;
$50 feet is much higher than the ordi-
nary church steeple, and 225 feet is
much higher than any In the United
States, with the exception Of perhaps d
score of sacred edifices.
The Produce Exchange tower or cam
panile looms 225 feet above ancient
Bowling Green, and that on the Western
Union Building. on higher ground,
seems to reach nearly the same altitude.
The new Petroleum Exchange, to be
finished next, will cost half million
Of dollars and will be much finer
building than the Stock Exchange.
Every resource is exhausted in the
construction of these palatial business
buildings; their foundations are laid
forty feet below the level of the street
and the masonry is as solid as that Of
an Old Roman aqueduct Where the
soil s.ems to be yielding piles are driven
down.; they are from thirty to forty feet
in hngth, being the trunks Of trees
brought from New Brunswick and Nova
Scotia. The Produce Exchange rests
on Is, 437 of these trees, SO that the
brokers are trading on the top of an old
forest.
In these fine structures there are
usually two completed stories below the
street, and above this rise eight or ten
stories more. Rents are enormous.
The buildings pay from to per cent.
and in one case at least understand,
10 per cent. on the money invested.
The well-known Mills building on Broad
Street cost q. zoe. O00 Thirteen build
ings were torn down. to secure its site.
It was erected by d. O. Mills. once a
hack driver and now worth SO, 000, 900.
The total amount of rent derived from
this magnificent building approximates
$500, 900 year.
Here are the offices of G. P. Hunting
ton, d. o. Mills and other California
and transcontinental magnates, as well
as such bankers and brokers as the
Seligmans, Henry Clews, President
James Smith, of the Stock Exchange;
the Kissams, brothers of Mrs. William
h. Vanderbilt, and others. Henry
Clews, l believe, pays IS square foot
for his SPLENDID Offices, the finest and
most elegantly fitted up of any broker
of stocks or grain in the metropolis,
andwhich cost him about $50. 900 year.
This enormous rent does not seem large
to man who made 81 ZOO, 900 last
year.
The halls in some of these commercial
palaces are IS wide as some of the
streets of Boston or old Italian cities,
and the stairs could accommodate
twenty men abreast. In some of the
larger structures there are six or eight
elevators constantly ascending and de-
scending. and glance downward
seems like looking into the bottomless
pit. The Produce Exchange has ten.
The most costly of these commercial
buildings is that of well-known life
insurance company on Bro adway near
Cedar street. which origi nally cost
| "a, ZOO, 900, and recent extension cost
ing another million. The signal service
corps here occupies tower on the roof,
and the janitor has another, and his
children havs playground an acre in
extent 1875 feet above roaring Broadway.
The company provides for tenants law
library of 1900 volumes. and the Insur-
ance Club and Down Town Law Club
have their rooms there. The president
of the company, by the way, receives
salary of $S7, 900 year.
The building of a well-known insur.
ance company on Nassau street is par
ticularly notable for its architectural
and artistic splendor. The marble halls
are wainscoted with marble; the princi-
pal rooms are finished in mahogany.
The Chamber of Commerce has its
rooms there, with q picture gallery Of
more than sixty merchants. dating back
to the days Of the Colonial government.
Some Of the more ancient business
worthless wear the small clothes, EN-.
broidered waistcoats and the neckcloth
of the quaint old days Of New York,
when such splendid business structures
as this would have appeared sheer mad
ness. Two of these portraits are oil
Alexander Hamilton and John Sherm
former Secretaries of the Treasury. In
this building, by the way, ex-President
Arthur had fine Offices, and next to him
in the last presidential campaign Gen.
eral Benjamin F. Butler had his
quarters. Another fine structure II
the United Bank Building. at the cor.
ner of Wall street and Broadway, where
i Z